Luisa Roldàn | Baroque sculptor

Luisa Roldàn | The Entombment of Christ, 1700-1701 | Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Entombment is one of the two "jewel-like sculptures" Luisa Roldán gave to the newly installed King Philip V of Spain in 1701, petitioning him to appoint her sculptor to the royal court.

In the previous decade she had pioneered a genre of sculpture - powerfully conceived and exquisitely modelled and painted figural groups, made on a deliberately intimate scale - of which this is perhaps the finest.

Luisa Roldàn | The Entombment of Christ, 1700-1701 | Metropolitan Museum of Art

Wisława Szymborska | Nulla due volte accade / Nothing Twice

Nulla due volte accade

nè accadrà. Per tal ragione

si nasce senza esperienza,

si muore senza assuefazione.

Anche agli alunni più ottusi

della scuola del pianeta

di ripeter non è dato

le stagioni del passato.

Marc Chagall | The window in the country, 1915

Maurice Ehlinger | Figurative painter

"I was just four years old and I said to myself: I too will paint!

I drew a lot and I escaped into nature where I was interested in everything.

I often skipped school, taking paper and colors with me".

- Maurice Ehlinger

Maurice Ambroise Ehlinger (1896-1981) was a French painter.

He joined the School of Fine Arts in Nancy.

Unfortunately, during the 1st World War, he was incorporated in 1916 and was not demobilized until 1919.

On his return, he went to Paris and joined the Ecole Supérieure des Beaux Arts where he became a pupil of the French painter François Flameng (1856-1923).

Vincent van Gogh | River Bank in Springtime, 1887 | Dallas Museum of Art

The light, fresh tones and free brush strokes in this painting of the banks of the Seine are characteristic of a period in Vincent van Gogh's life when, having left Holland to work in Paris, he was absorbing the methods of the impressionist and neo-impressionist, or pointillist, artists.

The traces of red paint visible around the edges of the painting are the remnants of a vibrant red border.

Van Gogh painted similar red borders on two other landscapes of the same size as this picture, and it is believed that they were originally shown together as a triptych. | Source: © Dallas Museum of Art

Vincent van Gogh | River Bank in Springtime, 1887 | Dallas Museum of Art

Madre Teresa di Calcutta | È Natale / It’s Christmas

È Natale ogni volta

che sorridi a un fratello

e gli tendi la mano.

È Natale ogni volta

che rimani in silenzio

per ascoltare l’altro.

Albert Maignan (French painter, 1845-1908) | The Repudiated, 1882

Boris Pasternak | La Stella di Natale / A Star of the Nativity

"Star of the Nativity" è uno dei sei poemi nella sequenza lirica più lunga che Boris Leonidovič Pasternak (Scrittore e poeta Russo, 1890-1960) pubblicò come ultimo capitolo del Doctor Zhivago.

Cinque delle sei poesie ruotano attorno alla Passione.

"Stella della Natività" è l'unica eccezione.

Boris Pasternak | La Stella di Natale

Era pieno inverno.

Soffiava il vento dalla steppa.

E aveva freddo il neonato nella grotta

sul pendio della collina.

Giorgio Vasari | The Adoration of the Magi, 1567 | National Galleries of Scotland

Marta Zamarska, 1987

Marta Zamarska is an emerging Polish artist and the runner-up of Back to Nature Showdown on Saatchi Art with her painting that judge Ged Quinn described as "Monet meets Edward Hopper".

Her painting "A Railway Impression II" was exhibited in the Saatchi gallery in London.

Marta Zamarska is one of 12 artists included in Invest in Art Part II on Saatchi Art.

She was also featured in the Best of 2013 on Saatchi Art.

Marta Zamarska | A Railway Impression II